THEY WERE all there. Fifty of them. We counted again to be sure. My father in Spanish, “Uno, dos, tres, cuatro...” and I in my English.
The sleepily murmuring hens had disappeared on Thursday and now on Sunday night they were all back in place. It had happened while we visited the nearby Bible conference. These meetings were a must with Papa. Even if something was ready for harvest we had to go to the spiritual “fiesta.” “God will take care of the farm if we put Him first,” said Papa.
So on Thursday afternoon we excitedly ate supper early, did the chores, and rode to the conference grove for the evening service. When we returned, an errand took me to the chicken shed. The door was open and in consternation I found every chicken was gone.
As usual we gathered for family worship before bedtime, and we waited to hear what Papa would say. My brother predicted that Papa would pray the chickens would come home. I said, “No, it is too much for even him to ask.”
But our father was a man of faith. The prayer that night was warmhearted. Papa wasn’t upset. He prayed for the person who had taken the hens. He asked God to bless this person! He also asked the Lord to touch his heart and to make him feel so miserable that he would bring the chickens back.
While Papa was asking the Lord to do this I groaned, “Oh, no, it is too much. Papa can’t believe this will happen.”
On Saturday afternoon we left for a camp meeting again. At the gathering next day my papa told about his chickens and that he was expecting them back.
I shall never forget how awestruck I was that Sunday night as my father, humble migrant turned American, small farmer and a man of faith, counted his chickens that had come home to roost. All the way to fifty. Every one of them was there.
But that wasn’t all. On Monday a neighbor pulled into our yard and confessed he was the thief. He said, “Mr. Garcia, you have been praying. Your God wouldn’t let me sleep until I returned every chicken.”
You perhaps, like Garcia’s neighbor, have some things to return. You have a life to give back. The prayers of dear ones have followed you across the country and possibly to distant nations. It is easy to run these days. The airlines and fast cars are everywhere and so convenient.
The eye of God follows us in our wanderings away from Him. The Divine Detective who ferreted out Mr. Garcia’s chicken thief knows every fact and fancy of our lives. “Thou God seest me.”
Listen to the psalmist as he exclaims about the eye of the Lord: “Whither shall I go from thy Spirit? or whither shall I flee from thy presence?
“If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there: if I make my bed in hell, behold thou art there.
“If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea; “Even there shall thy hand lead me, and thy right hand shall hold me.
“Yea, the darkness hideth not from thee; but the night shineth as the day: the darkness and the light are both alike to thee.
“Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts: and lead me in the way everlasting.”
Psa. 139: 7-10,12,17,23,24 H. C. in W. Advocate
ML-04/01/1973